“My dear Miss Arden, you have no choice.”
I looked at Grandmama, who shrugged sadly. Herr Steinberg plucked up my hand and slid the ring on my smallest finger. It hung on my hand like a tumor.
The wind frolicked down Kerepesi Street like an untrained vizsla puppy—it pushed its impudent nose at my skirts, tugged at my hair, and then darted off for long moments before returning to pummel me. The first leaves of autumn danced down the street before us. Buda-Pest in fall was much like a piece of music played on a cello: sweet, mellow, restful, but with unaccountable hints of melancholy.
It was good to be out, striding down the street with a purpose. William had invited Mátyás to his workshop, and Mátyás had extended the invitation to Gábor and me. It had been nearly a fortnight since my foray into the Binding, a week since Herr Steinberg put the spelled ring on me. I had spent the time mostly hiding, alternating between Grandmama’s drawing rooms and the shops in Váci Street, debating the merits of lace versus ribbon for my new dress, as though I were only an ordinary girl who wanted ordinary things. If the Circle was determined to watch me, I would bore them into inattention. I tried, once, to break the spell on the ring, but all I had won for my efforts was a pounding headache and blistered skin beneath the ring. Pál must have spelled it particularly to resist me.
I had heard nothing from Lady Berri.
Gábor had charmed us before leaving the house, a Romani casting that drew shadows to us and turned away attention.
“Won’t the ring register your spell?” I asked. If the Circle caught us casting a spell to go unnoticed, that would draw their attention far more effectively than doing nothing.
“I doubt it,” Mátyás said. “It’s not a Luminate spell. Probably the Circle doesn’t think anything else counts as magic.”
“Persuasion, not force,” Gábor reminded me. “There’s no ritual for the ring to recognize.”
I was tired of shutting myself up in the house, so I let myself be convinced.
Before me, Mátyás whistled tunelessly, his arms swaying with his long-limbed gait. Gábor walked beside me, close enough for his fingers to brush mine every few steps. With each grazing touch, warm prickles shot up my arm and into my stomach. But he did not look at me, and I could not tell if the contact was accidental or intended.
“Miss Arden, I have wanted to talk with you,” he said, speaking low so Mátyás would not overhear. My heart thumped. I wondered, for a wild, hopeful moment, if he meant to say something of his feelings for me.
“I am sorry for what happened. The Circle forcing their will on you must be intolerable,” he continued, and I blushed at my own foolishness. Now he did look at me, or rather, at the ring currently making an unsightly lump beneath my gloves. “But if this impels you to abandon a destructive path, it can only be a good thing.”
I stared at him. “It is a good thing to be trapped? To have someone else dictate your actions?”
He met my gaze evenly. “It is never good to be bound by rules not of your making. Any Romani could tell you that. But we still have choices. We can choose safety. Family. Life. You do not have to break the Binding. We can find other ways to create change.”
“And this revolution you plan, this is safe?”
“I am not a revolutionary. I want change, a society where Romani voices have a chance to be heard—something that will never happen so long as the Circle and the Hapsburgs rule together. I would prefer diplomacy, but I will fight if it comes to it. Change is never without cost.”
Ahead of us, Mátyás stopped to speak with an acquaintance. We paused a half dozen paces behind him.
I could have stomped my foot with frustration. With Herr Steinberg’s ring effectively preventing me from doing anything, Gábor’s arguments were particularly provoking. “You think I do not know that? Of course breaking the Binding is a risk—but I believe the risk is worth it for the change it will bring.”
He pressed his lips together, a dark flush staining his cheeks. “You don’t know what you risk. You can’t calculate its cost.”
A tremor of disquiet passed through me. I believed what I said. And yet—I could not be entirely sure how much of the certainty was my own, how much drawn from my lingering need to return to the world of the spell. I knew that Gábor would pounce on any sign of doubt, so I covered it over with anger.
“Then tell me! Don’t make vague allusions to a disastrous future. Respect me enough to assume I am an intelligent creature.” I could not bear it if Gábor patronized me as Freddy had. “You say there may be monsters. Have any of your people seen these creatures? Do they know?” Gábor had not seen the world of the Binding, as I had: the creatures of light, the dancing, and the laughter. Whatever I was releasing, it was not the destruction he feared.
“No,” he admitted. “But there may be other effects. The magic from the spell must go somewhere. Surely you haven’t forgotten what happened to my niece? Or to you, for that matter. Mátyás says you were unconscious for days after Sárvár.”
My words strangled in my throat. I had not forgotten. “Is your niece all right? Was it…was it truly her soul I pulled into the talisman?”
“She’s growing. But it’s early yet to know about her soul. My grandmother says it is.”
My fist closed around a handful of fabric from my skirt. I could not undo what had happened to Gábor’s niece. But I could—I hoped—make the world she grew up in easier for her. In any case, the situations were not the same. I had broken Noémi’s spell as she cast it, and the spell at Sárvár had been corrupted. The Binding spell was already cast. Its breaking would not be like the others. “Surely Lady Berri or Papa would have warned me if they feared that breaking the Binding would release destructive magic.”
Gábor shook his head. “I’m not sure they see past their own interest.”
“Lady Berri, perhaps, but not my father. Please,” I begged, “trust me to make the right decision as I trust you.”
“I care about you, Anna.” Gábor’s voice was pitched so low I strained to hear it. He glanced at Mátyás, but my cousin was still deep in conversation, oblivious to our exchange. “But I am afraid to trust you in this. I could not bear it if you were hurt.”
My heartbeat thundered in my ears. Something tremendous hung in the balance between us, something fragile as glass and poised to shatter.
“Please,” he echoed my plea. “Do not break the Binding.” Lower still, “You will break my heart.”
Words hammered against my throat, words of longing, words that could frame the way my pulse beat so sharp and hard when he spoke to me.